by Diana Palmer
The car trunk opened suddenly. Mikey’s hand had gone automatically under his jacket to the .45 he’d put there before Santi went into the hotel. He kept it in a secure compartment under the seat, custom-made. He hadn’t needed it in Jacobsville, but this was unknown territory, and it was dangerous not to go heeled. He had a concealed carry permit, but for Jersey, not here. He supposed he’d have to go see the sheriff in Jacobs County and get one for Texas. That would be Hayes Carson. He knew the sheriff from three years ago. They got on.
Santi opened the door and got in behind the wheel. “All the bags are in the trunk, chief,” he told his boss. “We need to stop anywhere else before we head south?”
“Not unless you’re hungry.”
“I could eat.”
“Well, there’s a nice restaurant in a better part of town. Let’s go looking.” He glanced out through the tinted windows at a young man who was giving the limo a real hard look. “I’m not overjoyed with the clientele hereabouts.”
“Me, neither.”
“So, let’s go. We’ll drive around and see if we can find someplace Italian. I think Paulie said a new place had just opened recently. Carlo’s. Put it in the computer.”
Santi fed it into the onboard GPS. “Got it, chief. Only three blocks away.”
“Okay! Head out.”
* * *
They were well into their plates of spaghetti when Mikey noticed a couple of customers in suits giving them a cursory inspection.
“Feds,” Mikey said under his breath. “At the second table over. Don’t look,” he added.
“Know them?”
“Nope,” Mikey said.
“FBI, you think?”
Mikey chuckled. “If they were, Paulie would have mentioned that I had a tail here in the city.”
“Then who?”
“If I were guessing, US Marshals,” he replied. “The big dark one looks vaguely familiar, but I can’t quite place him. He was working with Paulie during the time I spent in Jacobsville three years ago.”
“Marshals?” Santi asked, and he shifted restlessly.
“Relax. They aren’t planning to toss our butts in jail. There’s this thing called due process,” Mikey said imperturbably. “We’ll have fewer worries down in Jacobs County. Jacobsville is so small that any stranger sticks out. Besides, we’ve got shadows of our own.”
“Good ones?”
“You bet,” Mikey replied with a smug grin. “So eat your supper and I’ll move into my new temporary home.”
“I don’t like being down the road in a motel,” Santi muttered. “Even with all the other guys watching your back.”
“Well, I’m not sharing the room,” Mikey said flatly. “It’s barely big enough for me and all my stuff, without trying to fit you into it. No room for another bed, anyway.”
“I guess you got a point.”
“Of course I do. Besides, it’s not like I’m going to get hit until they track me down here.”
“The limo is going to attract attention,” Santi said worriedly.
“Yeah, well, no more attention than the gossip will, but there’s not a place in the world I’d be safer. Strangers stick out here. Remember, I told you about Cash Grier’s wife being tracked here by a contract killer, and what happened to him?”
Santi chuckled. “Yeah. Grier’s wife hit him so hard with an iron skillet that he ran to the cops for protection.”
“Exactly. Nobody messes with Tippy Grier. What a knockout. A movie star, and she’s married to the police chief and has two kids. I never thought Grier could settle down in a small town. He didn’t seem the sort.”
“That’s what everybody says.” Santi paused. “I feel bad about that poor girl we almost hit,” he added, surprisingly, because he wasn’t sentimental. “She was nice, and we thought she was trying to play us.”
“We come by our suspicious natures honestly,” Mikey reminded him. “But, yeah, she was nice. Needs looking after,” he said quietly. “Not that she seems the kind of woman who’d let anybody look after her.”
“I noticed that.”
Mikey glanced at his watch. “We’d better go.” He signaled to a waiter for the check.
* * *
Bernadette was reading in bed. The pain was pretty bad, a combination of the rain and the fall. She needed something to take her mind off it, so she pulled out her cell phone, on which she kept dozens of books. Many were romance novels. She realized that her condition would keep most men away, and it was nice to daydream about having a kind man sweep her off her feet.
She couldn’t stop thinking about the big dark-haired man who’d done that earlier in the evening. He was kin to Paul Fiore, who was married to Sari Grayling. Bernie worked with Sari in the local DA’s office. She wondered if she could get away with asking her anything about the man, who’d been very kind to her after mistaking her for some kind of con woman.
She shouldn’t be thinking about him. A man that handsome probably had women hanging on to his ankles everywhere he walked. He was apparently rich, as well. There was another woman in her office, the receptionist, Jessie Tennison, a gorgeous brunette in her late twenties, who was crazy about men and openly solicited any rich one who came into the office. Mr. Kemp, the DA, had already called her down about it once. A second offense would cost her the job, he’d added. Her position didn’t include sexual harassment of clients.
What a new world it was, Bernie mused, when a woman could be accused of what was often seen as a man’s offense. But, then, her coworker was very pretty. She was just ambitious. She had a failed marriage behind her. Gossip was that her ex-husband had been wealthy but had a gambling habit and lost it all on one draw of a card. Nobody knew, because the woman didn’t talk about herself. Well, not to the women in the office.
A sudden commotion caught her attention. There was movement in the hall. Some bumping and a familiar deep male voice. Her heart jumped. That was the man who’d brought her home earlier. She knew his voice already. It was hard to miss, with that definite New Jersey accent. She knew about that because of Paul Fiore. He had one just like it.
There was more noise, then a door closing. More footsteps. Voices. The front door opening and closing, and then a car driving away.
Mrs. Brown knocked at Bernie’s door and then slipped in, closing it behind her. “Sorry about the noise. Mr. Fiore’s just moving in,” she added with an affectionate smile.
Bernie tried not to show the delight she felt. “Is he going to stay long? Did he say?”
“Not really,” she said. “His driver is staying at a motel down the road.” She laughed. “Mr. Fiore said no way was he sharing that room with another man, especially not one as big as his driver.”
Bernie laughed softly. “I guess not.”
“So you’ll need to knock before you go into the bathroom, like I mentioned earlier,” Mrs. Brown continued. “Just in case. I told Mr. Fiore again that he’d need to do the same thing, since you’re sharing.” She looked worried. Bernie was flushed. “I’m so sorry. If I had a room with a bathroom free, I’d—”
“Those are upstairs,” Bernie interrupted gently, “and we both know that I have a problem with stairs.” She sighed and shook her head. “The rain and the walk and the fall pretty much did me in today. You were right. I should have gotten a cab. It isn’t that expensive, and I don’t spend much of what I make, except on books.” That was true. Her rent included all utilities and even the cable that gave her television access—not that she watched much TV.
“I know that walking is supposed to be good for you,” the older woman replied. “But not when you’re having a flare.” She drew in a breath. “Bernie, if you wrote the company that makes that injectable medicine, they might...”
“I already did,” Bernie said softly. “They offered me a discount, but even so, it’s almost a thousand dollars a month. Ther
e’s no way I could afford that, discount or not. Besides,” she said philosophically, “it might not work for me. Sometimes it doesn’t. It’s a gamble.”
“I guess so.” Mrs. Brown looked sad. “Maybe someday they’ll find a cure.”
“Maybe they will.”
“Well, I’ll let you get back to your book,” she teased, because she knew about the late-night reading habit. “Need anything from the kitchen before I turn out the lights?”
“Not a thing. I have my water right here.” She indicated two bottles of water that she kept by her bedside.
“You could have some ice in a glass to go with it.”
Bernie shook her head. “It would just melt. But thank you, Mrs. Brown. You’re so good to me.”
The older woman beamed. “I’m happy to have you here. You’re the only resident I’ve ever had who never complained about anything. You’ll spoil me.”
“That’s my line,” Bernie teased, and she laughed. It made her look pretty.
“Sleep well.”
“You, too.”
Mrs. Brown went out and closed the door.
Bernie thought about that injectable medicine. Her rheumatologist in San Antonio had told her about it, encouraged her to try to get it. At Bernie’s age, it might retard the progress of the disease, a disease that could lead to all sorts of complications, the worst of which was deformity in the hands and feet. Not only that, but RA was systemic. It could cause a lot of issues in other parts of the body, as well.
Chance, Bernie thought, would be a fine thing. She’d have to be very well-to-do in order to afford something so expensive as those shots. Well, meanwhile she had her other meds, and they worked well enough most of the time. It wasn’t every day that she fell in a cold rain almost in front of somebody’s fancy limousine. She smiled to herself and went back to her book.
* * *
Breakfast the next morning would have been interesting, Bernie thought to herself as she ate hers from a tray her kindly landlady had provided. But she couldn’t get up. A weather system had moved in, dropping even more rain, and Bernie’s poor body was still trying to cope with yesterday’s fall. What a good thing it was Saturday. She’d have had a time getting to work.
Just as she finished the last drop of her coffee, there was a perfunctory knock and the man who’d rescued her walked in.
She pulled the sheet up over her breasts. The gown covered her nicely, but she’d never had a man in her bedroom in her life, except for her late father and her doctor. She flushed.
Mikey grinned from ear to ear. He loved that reaction. The women in his life were brassy and easy and unshockable. Here was a violet under a staircase, undiscovered, who blushed because a man saw her in her nightgown.
“Mrs. Brown said you might like a second cup of coffee,” he said gently, approaching the bed with a cup and saucer.
“Oh, I, yes, I...thank you.” She couldn’t even talk normally. She was furious with herself, especially when her hands shook a little as she took the cup and saucer from him. He lifted the empty one from the tray, so she’d have someplace to put the new one.
He cocked his head and looked at her, fascinated. Her long blond hair was in a braid, a little frizzled from being slept on. She was wearing a cotton gown, and he could see the straps with their eyelet trim. It reminded him of his grandmother, who’d never liked artificial fabric.
“You aren’t feeling so good today, are you?” he asked. “Need me to run you over to the doctor?”
The flush grew. “Oh. Thank you. No, I’m...well, it’s sort of normal. When it rains, it hurts more. And I fell.” She bit her lip because he looked so guilty. “It wasn’t your fault, or your driver’s,” she added quickly. “I’m clumsy. My toe hit a brick on the sidewalk that was just a little raised and it caused me to lose my balance. That’s why I use the cane on bad days. I’m clumsy even on flat surfaces...”
“My grandmother had arthritis,” he said softly. “Her little hands and feet were gnarled like tree roots.” He wasn’t watching, so he didn’t notice the discomfort in Bernie’s face—her poor feet weren’t very pretty, either. “I used to carry her in and out of the house when she had bad spells. She loved to sit in the sun.” His dark eyes were sad. “She weighed barely eighty pounds, but she was like a little pit bull. Even the big guys were afraid of her.”
“The big guys?” she asked, lost in his soft eyes.
He shrugged. “In the family,” he said.
She frowned. She didn’t understand.
“You really are a little violet under a stair,” he mused to himself. “The family is what insiders call the mob,” he explained. “The big guys are the dons, the men who run things. I’m from New Jersey. Most of my family was involved in organized crime. Well, except Paulie,” he added with a chuckle. “He was always the odd guy out.”
She smiled. “He’s married to Sari Grayling, who works in our office.”
He nodded. “Sweet woman. Her sister is one hel—heck of an artist,” he said, amending the word he’d meant to use.
“She truly is. They had her do a portrait of our local college president, who was retiring. It looked just like him.”
He chuckled. “The one she painted three years ago saved her life. Her father whacked a woman whose son hired contract men to go after Grayling’s daughters. Merrie painted the big don from back home, and he called off the hit.” He didn’t add how Tony Garza had called it off.
“We heard about all that. I wasn’t working for the district attorney’s office at the time. I was working for a local attorney who moved his practice to San Antonio. But we all knew,” she added. “Everybody talked about it. He actually gave her away at her wedding, didn’t he?”
He nodded. “Tony’s wife died young. He never had kids, never remarried.” He grinned. “He tells everybody he’s Merrie’s dad. Gets a reaction, let me tell you, especially when he mentions that her brother-in-law is a fed.”
She sipped coffee, fascinated by him.
It was mutual. He smiled very slowly, his heart doing odd things in his chest. It had been many years since he’d felt such tenderness for anything female, except his grandmother.
“Do you have family?” he asked suddenly.
Her face clouded. “Not anymore,” she said softly, without elaborating.
“Me, neither,” he replied. “Except for Paulie. We’re first cousins.”
“Mr. Fiore’s nice,” she said.
He nodded. He was thinking about Tony, in hiding and waiting for developments that would save him from life in prison. Mikey had the proof that could save him. But he had to stay alive long enough to present it. Here, in Jacobsville, was his best bet. He’d agreed, knowing how many ex-mercs and ex-military lived here.
But as he stared at this sweet, kind young woman, he thought about the danger he might be putting her in. Even in a foolproof situation, there could be snags. After all, the contract killer who’d been after Merrie actually got onto Ren Colter’s property in Wyoming and had her bedroom staked out before she came back to her sister and brother-in-law.
Bernie cocked her head. “Something’s worrying you.”
He started. “How do you know?”
She drew in a slow breath and averted her eyes. “People think I’m strange.”
He moved a step closer to the bed. “How so?”
She shifted restlessly. “I...well, I sort of know things about people.” She flushed.
He nodded. “Like Merrie. She has that sort of perception. She painted a picture of me that nailed me to a T, and she’d never even met me.”
She looked up. “Oh. Then you’re not...intimidated by strange things.”
He chuckled. “Nothing intimidates me, kid,” he teased.
She smiled.
“So. You think something’s worrying me.” One brown eye narrowed. “What, exactly?
”
She drew in a long breath and stared into his eyes. “Somebody wants to keep you from telling something you know,” she said after a minute, and saw the shock hit his face.
“Damn.”
“And it worries you that somebody might hurt anybody around you.”
“Need to get a crystal ball and a kerchief and set up shop,” he teased gently. “You’re absolutely on the money. But that’s between you and me, okay? The fewer people who know things, the fewer can talk about them.”
She nodded. “I don’t talk about things I know, as a rule. I work for the DA’s office. Gossip isn’t encouraged.”
He chuckled. “I guess not.”
Her coffee was now stone-cold, but she sipped it, for something to do.
He stared at her with conflicting emotions. She was unique, he thought. He’d never met anybody in his life like her.
She stared back. Her heart was almost smothering her with its wild beat. She was grateful that she had the covers pulled up, so he couldn’t see her gown fluttering with her heartbeat.
There was another quick knock and Mrs. Brown came in. “Finished, dear?” she asked as she went to pick up the tray. “You can just set that on here, Mr. Fiore,” she told Mikey with a smile. “I’ll...”
He put it on the tray and then took the tray from her. “You’re too delicate to be lifting heavy weights,” he said with a grin. “I’ll carry it for you.”
“Oh, Mr. Fiore,” she laughed, and blushed like a girl. “If you need anything, you just call me, Bernie, ok?”
“I will. Thanks. Both of you,” she added.
Mrs. Brown smiled. As Mikey went through the door, he turned and winked at her.
That wink kept her heart fluttering all day, and it kept her awake most of the night.